The National Telegraph - Wyatt Claypool - Conservatives gain another Senator & Liberals fumble in Parliament

00:00:00.000 Hey guys, Wyatt Claypool here.

00:00:03.060 I assume that you're just as surprised as I am to see Canada's Senate become such a significant story in Canadian politics over the last little while.

00:00:12.860 In just two and a half weeks, we have seen three Senators across the floor from different Senate groups over to the Conservative Senate caucus.

00:00:22.480 Now, is this majorly shifting the balance of power in the Senate? Not at all.

00:00:27.780 You see how the Senate works is that usually people who have already had long and storied careers in other areas of Canadian politics or in business or in art get appointed usually in their late 50s or 60s to be part of the Senate.

00:00:42.000 And then they must retire at the age of 75.

00:00:45.140 And this means because Justin Trudeau was the Prime Minister for nearly 10 years and also Stephen Harper didn't even fill all the vacancies that he was allowed to fill, Justin Trudeau ended up appointing, I think, around half of what the current Senate is made up of, maybe even more than half at this point.

00:01:04.420 And so naturally, many people on the Senate are left-wing political hacks.

00:01:09.360 And I say that because there are technically no liberals in the Senate.

00:01:14.800 Justin Trudeau appoints people and they join different Senate groups with neutral-sounding names like the Progressive Senate Group, the Independent Senate Group, or the Canadian Senate Group.

00:01:26.040 This is all, again, just some marketing to make it seem like he is appointing nonpartisan individuals who are going to lend their wisdom to advising the House of Commons.

00:01:37.660 But obviously, that's not actually how it's worked out.

00:01:40.440 There are far, far-left political activists on it and liberal insiders.

00:01:45.340 But this is still a significant story, even if it's not like the Conservatives are going to be able to start blocking legislation here and there, because it tells you about how the fluid dynamics of Canadian politics are currently going.

00:01:58.460 And I think it demonstrates that a lot of people on the Senate are just not happy with the current government at all.

00:02:04.980 In fact, the first two people who left to join the Conservative Senate Caucus, I believe from the Independent Senate Group, which is kind of like the mainstream liberal Senate Group, were saying that they are just sort of upset with the lack of action the current government has taken on many major areas of public policy that matter to average Canadians.

00:02:25.180 They don't really want to be associated with that anymore, so they joined the Conservative Caucus.

00:02:29.020 Now, yesterday, we had Senator Larry Smith join the Conservative Caucus, and this is a little bit more of a nuanced case, because Larry Smith at one time was the leader of the Conservative Senate Caucus before crossing the floor in 2019 to join the Canadian Senate Caucus, which is kind of a, you know, centrist, you know, center-left socially but center-right fiscally group of senators.

00:02:55.860 But now he's come back, probably because of the momentum of the other two, and realizing with the Conservatives representing such a large portion of the House of Commons, it feels silly when they're sitting there with only 11 senators.

00:03:10.680 Now, I want to bring up what the current breakdown of the Senate looks like, because of the appointment system, the Senate is more rigged than the country music charts.

00:03:19.960 This is what the current structure of the Senate looks like.

00:03:23.940 We have 46 independent senators, we have 20 Canadian Senate group senators, and we have 18 progressive Senate group senators, and we only have 14 Conservatives.

00:03:35.000 There are seven non-affiliated, and then there is currently one vacancy that Prime Minister Mark Carney is allowed to fill.

00:03:41.500 Now, this should tell you why the Senate is so useless. 0.81

00:03:44.520 Now, I understand the value in having some continuity in government, that if suddenly tomorrow the House of Commons is taken over by a new upstart party and they win 100% of the seats, at least you have people who are there representing what past administrations believed in because they are their appointees.

00:04:03.840 But again, with so many appointments being given to people who are already 65 years old and they're only going to be there 10 years, or even sometimes people in their 70s, there was that radio show host that was recently given a Senate seat, and he was already like 72 or something like that, or 70.

00:04:19.020 And so he's not going to be there very long before he's forced to retire.

00:04:22.720 But this is nuts, that there's only 14, less than 14% of the entire Senate is conservative.

00:04:31.260 We have 18 far-left progressives, we have 46 liberals, and we have 20 centrists who are probably also a little bit more liberal-leaning. 0.98

00:04:41.120 This is dumb.

00:04:42.500 This is why we need a triple-E Senate, you know, effective, elected, and equal across the country, because right now we have provinces like Nova Scotia that have 10 senators, and then Alberta has like three or like six or whatever. 0.99

00:04:56.640 It's pathetic.

00:04:57.900 But regardless, the thing about this that's still significant, though, is why didn't these senators not cross over when Justin Trudeau was prime minister? 0.87

00:05:06.580 And I think that, and I've talked about this in a previous video, I think they were waiting for Justin Trudeau to step down, see who he was going to be replaced with, see if this person was significantly going to change their agenda from what was going on with Justin Trudeau and actually start delivering on, you know, some reforms that average Canadians want.

00:05:26.620 And as soon as Mark Carney started pursuing basically the same things, Mark Carney is smarter in how he does it, so I'm going to warn conservatives out there, Mark Carney is not going to implode any day.

00:05:38.880 The guy sucks, and we're about to get into some of his absolutely awful MPs' performances in Parliament in just a little bit here, but Mark Carney isn't flashy anything.

00:05:49.180 And because he's not flashy, he's not going to explode like a flash in the pan and burn out in Parliament and have a giant scandal take him down. 0.99

00:05:57.760 Mark Carney is going to be corrupt.

00:06:00.200 He's going to be radical. 0.95

00:06:01.700 But he's going to be radical and corrupt in more boring ways than Trudeau. 1.00

00:06:05.620 Trudeau was a clown. 1.00

00:06:06.940 You couldn't get any more loud and boisterous and obnoxious than him. 1.00

00:06:12.300 So when Trudeau failed, it would be a spectacular fail.

00:06:16.420 Mark Carney is not spectacular.

00:06:18.120 And so his wins are also not going to be particularly spectacular, but his failures aren't either.

00:06:24.580 He is going to be, in a certain sense, a steady hand for the Liberal Party.

00:06:28.260 It's not going to be a steady hand for Canada.

00:06:30.560 He might do some certain good things on policy because maybe he's smarter than Trudeau and he's going to try and do a few things that appeal to moderate Canadians and then do some of his more left-wing liberal stuff on the side.

00:06:42.500 But in general, though, people need to brace themselves to know that he's not going to be taken down anytime soon.

00:06:48.120 But, again, the Senate defections prove to me that underneath the surface, many of these people realize he's not really going to change the Liberals' agenda in any way.

00:07:00.140 And so they're not comfortable representing that anymore.

00:07:02.560 So they're going to leave.

00:07:03.640 And so, yes, the Conservatives still only have 14 out of 105 seats, but it's better than 11, and it is indicative of movements inside politics that the Conservatives are representing more of the center these days.

00:07:18.900 It's not just to say that they've abandoned the right.

00:07:22.080 I think the Conservatives would do well to actually move a little bit more right on several issues like parental rights and immigration and taxes.

00:07:29.020 But they represent the center in the sense that the left, outside of the fact that they could get a bunch of people to vote for them because they were opposing Trump, their actual positions are very much only appealing to those who live in downtown urban areas.

00:07:44.100 They have a very metropolitan feel when it comes to policy.

00:07:47.940 Now, again, they won in 2025 because they didn't even have to talk about those policies because they just talked about Trump the entire time.

00:07:53.960 But if there's an election that's about their policies and their vision for the country, they will lose.

00:07:59.800 Anyways, now I want to get to some stuff that was going on in Parliament today, and I want to highlight someone who is, I'm not even saying quickly becoming my favorite MP, like I'm shocked.

00:08:13.020 I'm not shocked that this person is becoming one of my favorites at all because I used to watch his show.

00:08:17.760 He's fantastic.

00:08:19.000 You know who I'm talking about.

00:08:20.460 That is MP Andrew Lawton, who represents what area?

00:08:26.820 Elgin, St. Thomas, London, South.

00:08:29.120 Whenever names become like those three jammed together geographic areas, I always start to forget what they are.

00:08:35.920 But it is shocking how bad many of these liberal MPs are at answering questions or even just doing their jobs.

00:08:45.880 Like Mark Carney is a pretty buttoned down guy.

00:08:48.020 I am shocked he made many of these people ministers.

00:08:51.120 But I think it proves that, if anything, Mark Carney is far more of a politician than he ever let on.

00:08:58.800 Oh, I've never been elected before.

00:09:00.520 I'm an outsider.

00:09:02.000 I'm not a politician.

00:09:03.000 He makes very politician-y type decisions.

00:09:06.420 I don't like the Liberal Party, but I could probably find you a far more competent-looking cabinet if I looked through who's currently in their caucus and who would do a good job.

00:09:17.000 Carney seems to surround himself with yes-men who make him feel comfy.

00:09:23.220 And that's very much a trait like Justin Trudeau.

00:09:27.360 Surround yourself with people that you just personally like, and then it makes your life easier to do that.

00:09:33.840 Anyway, so I also want to cut over to this clip of Andrew Lawton basically confronting a Liberal minister over a particular issue he wanted to bring up.

00:09:43.120 Mr. Speaker, baseless smears like that are why these Liberals can't be trusted to regulate speech in this country.

00:09:49.460 For years, this Liberal government has determined to censor what Canadians see and say online.

00:09:56.100 From Bill C-11, which put the Liberals in control of YouTube algorithms, to Bill C-18, which squeezed out small and independent media, and to their Thought Crime Bill C-63.

00:10:06.760 Now we learn in the National Post that cabinet ministers over there are all clamouring over who gets to be responsible for the latest online censorship law.

00:10:14.360 So will the minister who gets to censor what Canadians say, please reveal themselves now?

00:10:26.360 Even Google agreed that they should do this.

00:10:35.120 Google will pay $100 million to help Canadian journalism in this country.

00:10:39.920 No, that's not even true.

00:10:44.400 You know what Google did?

00:10:45.740 Google was extorted into giving money over.

00:10:49.540 Meta doesn't want to do it. 1.00

00:10:50.920 Notice he never brings up Meta, who said, we're not paying you $50 million a year in order to put Canadian news on our site.

00:10:59.060 Because that was what they were doing.

00:11:00.140 They're basically saying, you owe Canadian journalists money because they post news articles on your site, which helps drive traffic to your site.

00:11:06.580 It's like, yeah, people are doing that voluntarily.

00:11:10.300 People like myself, when I used to write articles rather than make videos, I would use Facebook because it's a very easy way of distributing articles to your audience.

00:11:19.000 I wasn't sitting there thinking, Mark Zuckerberg better send me a check for all this work I'm doing for him.

00:11:24.720 I thought he had built me a platform that was very effective and efficient, and I was happy to use it.

00:11:30.400 But the Liberals, because they're greedy and because their legacy media allies are constantly near broke, had to basically try and force Google and Facebook into giving their media buddies money.

00:11:42.780 An international U.S.-based company would agree to do that, but the Conservative Party of Canada would vote against this, would prevent deaths from happening, would want to prevent our media from getting $100 million so that there's more local content, more journalists hired in our newsroom across the country.

00:12:01.960 It is simply unthinkable.

00:12:04.680 It is immoral, Mr. Speaker.

00:12:06.960 You're talking about immoral.

00:12:09.600 His justification for censorship was we get money and someone agreed with us.

00:12:17.520 No justification for why people should be censored, just that we get things if we do it.

00:12:23.200 And then he's going to bring up morality to Andrew Lawton here, who worked in independent media and was shut down by the government's censorship bills.

00:12:31.820 Because it does make it harder to distribute his content and his videos when he will stop being able to upload any of it on Facebook.

00:12:40.540 None of us still can do it.

00:12:42.480 Here's another one.

00:12:43.920 Here is Michael Cooper, another great Conservative MP, asking the Liberals about GS, GC, what is it?

00:12:51.120 I just looked at it a second ago.

00:12:53.660 GCS strategies, basically not having to repay any of the money they stole from taxpayers.

00:12:59.640 Took in, I believe, around $100 million.

00:13:03.200 You know, so all that money is apparently we don't care that much about the value of money because Stephen Gilboa celebrates getting $100 million from Google.

00:13:11.440 At the same time, they burn $100 million on nonsense like that Arrive Can app that didn't end up actually working and it was a bad app to be made in the first place.

00:13:20.940 Regardless, though, here is their response to why they're not even trying to retrieve the money.

00:13:24.820 St. Albert's, Surgeon River.

00:13:27.200 Mr. Speaker, the Auditor General found no proof of work in nearly half of the contracts awarded to GC strategies.

00:13:35.060 These Liberals gave millions to GC strategies to do literally nothing.

00:13:41.380 Taxpayers deserve a refund and they deserve a refund now.

00:13:45.480 So, will the Liberals support our Conservative motion to get taxpayers their money back, yes or no?

00:13:52.220 Good question.

00:13:52.880 Good question, Mr. Secretary. 0.99

00:13:53.960 This should be, you know what, if I would do, if I'm a Liberal strategist and I wasn't working with idiots, I would just say agree with him. 0.99

00:14:03.100 Just agree with him. 0.97

00:14:04.380 Just say, okay, we'll vote for your motion and we'll try our best to go hunt down that money. 0.87

00:14:07.620 And then, even if you're corrupt, even if you're corrupt, just lie.

00:14:12.460 They are not even good at lying.

00:14:14.120 But let's see how they handle this.

00:14:15.600 Mr. Speaker, we agree, as I've said, that the integrity of our procurement process is about most importance to Canadians.

00:14:22.340 That's exactly why we have deemed this company ineligible to enter into contracts for the next seven years.

00:14:27.800 And we've referred the matter to the RCMP.

00:14:30.900 Legal action is ongoing.

00:14:33.200 Mr. Sunshine Baby made a very good point about this.

00:14:36.720 What does banning GC strategies even do?

00:14:39.980 It's not like a company with, you know, like, with, like, bulldozers and other, like, equipment, heavy construction equipment, and it was building buildings or whatever, and it can't take government contracts for government buildings anymore, or anything that the public sector is investing in.

00:14:57.440 And that would be something, because you can't just simply take all those assets and transfer them to a new company.

00:15:04.660 It would get noticed immediately.

00:15:07.640 GC strategies isn't even, like, I don't even think they have a permanent location.

00:15:12.520 They could just come up with a numbered company, a new numbered company name, and then start all this all over again, and then just have the two main guys just kind of be background people for the new group that they work for.

00:15:24.400 So that was a good point by Mr. Sunshine Baby.

00:15:26.760 Banning them for seven years doesn't do anything.

00:15:28.800 And who, why do they care?

00:15:30.220 They've already made millions, and apparently they don't have to pay it back.

00:15:34.060 You know, a member of St. Albert's Surgeon River.

00:15:36.720 Mr. Speaker, do you know what it's called when a company submits an invoice and accepts payment for work that wasn't done?

00:15:43.640 It's called fraud.

00:15:45.380 It's called theft.

00:15:46.940 And under these liberals, GC strategies robbed taxpayers for millions.

00:15:52.420 Will the liberals.

00:15:53.420 Finally, finally, take responsibility and vote with Conservatives to get taxpayers for money back.

00:16:00.240 General Parliamentary Secretary.

00:16:03.420 Of course, misconduct in our procurement process at any moment is completely unacceptable.

00:16:10.220 That's exactly why our government has acted on this matter.

00:16:13.780 We've done so responsibly.

00:16:15.580 We've ensured the integrity of the system.

00:16:18.080 We've ensured this company can no longer do any business with the federal government for seven years.

00:16:24.160 The matter has been referred to the RCMP and legal action is ongoing.

00:16:28.300 Again, just agree with them.

00:16:31.940 Just agree that we should try and get the money back.

00:16:33.960 They won't even agree to that, which just makes it feel like they're hiding something.

00:16:37.720 Like maybe there's liberals who are taking money from GC strategies in order to get these contracts.

00:16:43.220 So let's not look into it anymore because that might not do well if we're trying to retrieve all the money and then we find out some of our own ministers have some of that money in their bank accounts.

00:16:52.460 Anyways, but now I want to jump over to yet another clip of Andrew Laudan because, again, the guy's absolutely tearing it up in Parliament these days.

00:17:02.780 He's just so good.

00:17:04.020 Here is him talking again or debating back and forth with a liberal in estimates, which I actually like the estimates debates because it's not like question period where you can only go back once or twice.

00:17:13.680 You can keep going back at each other in estimates because it will go on for hours.

00:17:19.500 Thank you, Chair.

00:17:20.340 How many people work for the federal public service?

00:17:24.280 I already love this line of questioning because this is the area of government I hate the most.

00:17:30.100 Bureaucratic bloat.

00:17:31.800 The government or government workers, employees have increased by 40 percent since the liberals got in in 2015.

00:17:38.580 And that doesn't even count for all of the extra contractors and consultants who don't directly work for the government, but they have government contracts.

00:17:46.200 And the thing is, have you noticed the, you know, quality of service going up?

00:17:51.620 No.

00:17:52.020 In fact, quality of service has been going down.

00:17:53.880 It's like our health care industry or health care systems all across Canada.

00:17:58.300 Alberta, my home province, is a great example.

00:18:00.820 We spent the most per capita on health care and we have some of the slowest wait times because the actual quality of care, the wait times have nothing to do with the money thrown out the system.

00:18:10.880 It happens to do with allocation of money.

00:18:13.340 We don't allocate for front lines and we have bloated to HR departments and bureaucracies and and just managers on top of managers.

00:18:20.760 The Honourable Minister.

00:18:22.100 The Honourable Minister.

00:18:22.140 Thank you, Chair.

00:18:24.240 Federal workforce forces over 350,000 people in public service.

00:18:33.100 Congratulations.

00:18:34.080 How many worked for the federal government when the Liberals took over in 2015?

00:18:38.480 The Honourable Minister.

00:18:39.300 Mr. Chair, the public service has, we have, our population was, a number.

00:18:52.280 One of the minister's aides just handed him a piece of paper.

00:18:54.740 I'm hoping it has the answer.

00:18:55.900 How many people worked for the federal government in 2015 when the Liberals took office?

00:19:00.360 Honourable Minister.

00:19:01.020 Mr. Chair, my colleague expect that, no, it is.

00:19:13.200 I have to love that Andrew Lawton is on a crusade to make sure that every single Liberal minister looks like a complete fool for not being able to answer basic questions. 0.87

00:19:24.560 This, again, is embarrassing stuff. 0.92

00:19:26.940 These are numbers that should be very easy for people to remember.

00:19:30.240 These are not things that anyone should forget.

00:19:32.900 Pretty much every MP should actually probably know what the workforce has looked like between different years.

00:19:38.800 Because even now, if you know it's grown by 40%, you can probably just, you know, take out 40% of what the current workforce looks like.

00:19:45.560 And that's how it, like, you know, to get the number that you're looking for.

00:19:48.800 So if it was like, if it's 390,000 now and it's grown by 40% since 2015, it was probably previously around, you know, 275,000.

00:19:58.200 But the guy just clearly doesn't have any clue.

00:20:00.580 Just like the other guy who didn't even know, the public safety minister, who didn't even know what an RPAL license or a PAL license was, which is a license you need in order to carry a firearm or even own one.

00:20:11.140 There is a rule member.

00:20:13.700 I'll spot the minister.

00:20:14.860 I'm feeling generous, chair.

00:20:16.600 Last, in 2015, it was 250,000.

00:20:19.480 That's an increase of 107,000.

00:20:22.060 My guess was pretty good.

00:20:23.520 Or 40% in the last 10 years.

00:20:26.600 Are taxpayers getting 40% more out of their federal government?

00:20:30.860 Honorable minister.

00:20:31.780 Mr. Chair, we're here to talk about our main estimates, which includes payments and services to Canadians.

00:20:45.920 Remember.

00:20:47.080 Main estimates include the money spent on personnel in the federal government.

00:20:51.060 Are taxpayers getting 40% more out of the federal public service than they were in 2015?

00:20:56.360 I would even just say, are they getting more?

00:20:59.600 Are they getting more service?

00:21:01.380 Because they could try and weasel around and say, well, you know, the population's also grown and that's why we need more employees.

00:21:07.260 Obviously, the population hasn't grown 40%.

00:21:09.140 But even then, are we even getting more service?

00:21:13.880 There's new programs, I suppose, that exist.

00:21:17.000 But all the existing programs, have they improved in quality or gone down?

00:21:21.000 Because not a single one is better.

00:21:23.560 Honorable minister.

00:21:26.080 Mr. Chair, we are here to talk about main estimates.

00:21:33.240 And we have 486 million.

00:21:38.020 Honorable member.

00:21:39.280 Apparently, the minister isn't here to talk about anything, Chair.

00:21:42.080 But I'll try again.

00:21:43.080 In 23-2024, the Public Service Commission annual report said there was a 3% increase in the federal public service.

00:21:51.240 The Canadian population grew by 1.8% in 2024.

00:21:56.760 Does the minister think it's normal and justifiable that the federal public service is outpacing population growth?

00:22:04.540 Honorable minister.

00:22:07.280 Mr. Chair, can I ask my colleague to repeat the question, please?

00:22:13.020 I'm just going to end it there.

00:22:14.000 That's halfway through.

00:22:15.820 I will link the rest of that down in the description below if you guys want to watch that.

00:22:21.000 It's pure torture.

00:22:22.780 These guys truly do not know what they're doing.

The National Telegraph - Wyatt Claypool - June 14, 2025

Conservatives gain another Senator & Liberals fumble in Parliament

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